POLITICS

On Romney's Heels, Huntsman Announces Foreign-Policy Speech

Former Utah governor Jon Huntsman will lay out his “foreign-policy vision and priorities” on Monday in New Hampshire, he announced in a Politico editorial on Friday. Huntsman said that his foreign-policy stance will offer a “stark contrast” to the positions held by the rest of the Republican presidential field—and he specifically criticized the views of rival Mitt Romney.

“Romney has called for adherence to a rigid level of defense spending. He claimed any defense cuts would represent a ‘grave mistake,’ ” Huntsman wrote. “This sort of thinking, especially at a time when our country is streaking toward unsustainable levels of debt, is flawed.”

Huntsman noted that Romney will give a foreign-policy speech on Friday; the former Massachusetts governornwill speak at the Citadel in South Carolina.

Huntsman argued that the military needs to reduce wasteful spending, engage with allies, and expand "economic partnerships and trade agreements."

“We are still saddled with a top-heavy, post-Cold War infrastructure. It needs to be rethought and reduced,” Huntsman said. “We need more agility, more intelligence and more economic engagement with the world." Huntsman called for ending nation-building and withdrawing from Iraq and Afghanistan. "A president must never again allow our nation to be lured into a murky quagmire of bloody civil war — like we were for years during Vietnam," he wrote.